neurological dryer lint

sometimes i take for granted how excellent of a community Lifespring is. i forget how solid the leadership of the church is and how welcome i always feel there. and it's tough to sit in a room with Dick Alexander for more than five minutes and not learn something. yesterday he talked rather honestly about the failures of the American evangelical movement - turning America into a place where everyone feels 'burned' by Christians - and how because of that cultural shift, trying the old 'strategy' - or any strategy for that matter - to introduce people to Christ is useless, doing more harm than good. he talked about simply caring for people instead of turning them into a project, loving them and treating them with respect, avoiding judgement, etc...

i feel like it's fairly difficult to offend me through traditional means. i've said before on here that, due to spending so much time with high school kids, i'm much more prone to judge 'stupid' Christians than people who aren't followers of Jesus. what struck me on Sunday was that five years ago this was a disputed, controversial point among American Christians and i think it's become the de facto standard today, mostly due to the dissemination of this theory through megachurches. which is a Good Thing, i think. in a few years when the 'stupid' Christians like Pat Robertson and some radio hosts are gone from the radar, maybe the average American won't cringe in fear so much when they hear the term 'Christian'. heck maybe I won't cringe at the thought.

so i gave the Fusion a couple of tries this weekend... it's like deer hunting with an M1A1 Abrams tank. i don't think i can handle that much raw shaving power. in fact, i know i can't, i cut myself both times, and i haven't cut myself shaving since high school. in fact, the last time i clearly remember it was the (second) prom night, at McAuley... cut myself about 20 minutes before i left and it didn't stop bleeding until 15 minutes into dinner. so i'm sneaking out this paper towel every few seconds to try to get it to stop while meeting a dozen people i don't know and sitting at someone's table. i think i bled on their tablecloth. so now every time that family looks at that tablecloth, they think, there's the blood from that incredibly nervous little kid that was sweating like crazy, i think he was on LSD or something.